A step forward into night
by seven dials
Summary: After being seriously wounded during the course of a mission, Ken finds himself helplessly falling towards nothing at all, with no hope of a reprieve. One-shot; completed. Contains implied violence and dark themes.


**A step forward into night**  
a Weiss Kreuz fanfiction by laila

Standard Copyright Disclaimer: Weiss Kreuz, it's characters, indices, and all things associated with it remain the property of Kyoko Tsuchiya, Koyasu Takehito, Project Weiss and Movic. I'm writing this because it's fun, I have some time on my hands and a head full of very angsty ideas, not because I have any notion of profiting from my twisted visions. 

Author's Notes: Dark fic. Very dark. This idea came upon me late last night. Be warned, this one-shot is not at all pleasant. I can't say too much about the plot for fear of giving it away, but suffice to say I have never written a fic like this before and never wanted to either – this time, however, the muse was most insistent. I feel pretty wrung out now I've finished it and am very grateful that I have another, far lighter one-shot fic in the planning stages to take my mind off the sheer bleakness of this thing. Why I wrote _this_ as a break from 'Seuche' I have absolutely no idea. I don't know where the title came from, considering I'm normally all for my one-word German titles. For various reasons, though, it just seemed to fit.

* * *

The end came so suddenly it was almost funny. Almost a joke. It was almost as if, instead of crying out at the way pain took root, he should have laughed. Laughed at the irony of it, or perhaps only in simple recognition. Hard to believe that it should be so straightforward after all… 

His scream was a stifled thing, half-caught in the throat; it was more a cry of surprise than it was one of pain or fear or rage. And he lost his footing and fell, suddenly enervated. Landed heavily on his back, instinctively raising his hands to protect his head. As if that mattered now. As if it mattered how awkwardly he fell. The body clung to the familiar patterns of survival even as the mind told him it was useless. It was only instinct which had him try to find his feet even as burgeoning agony constrained him. Agony had him manage no more than to turn onto his side, his jacket twisted beneath him, and curl up around the wound. He pressed his arms across the tear in his chest in a desperate, impossible attempt to check his hasty, gleefully liberated blood. To keep himself together…

It could only be karma that said he'd go this way.

Ken had often wondered what it was like from the other end. The sharp end – the black, twisted joke rose to mind unbidden and he smiled bleakly. He wouldn't have recognized it as a smile, should he have seen his face. He wondered why he was smiling, why he was bothering with the pointless bravado that was black humor. This time the joke was on him. A moment of defiance… but no use denying it. He wished he hadn't known with such awful clarity how long he had left. A matter of minutes: no time at all and yet an eternity - to him. To him it was all that remained.

It was a lifetime. The rest of his life. Because his life was virtually over.

And he – the assassin Siberian, the murderer – greeted the inevitability that was his own death with the same sense of hopeless wonder as had his victims. Death claimed him with no less ease than it had any of the men and women he had killed, and it surprised him that it should be so. Unlike them, though, he saw his situation for what it was. No way for Ken to make-believe he hadn't felt the irrevocability of this. He couldn't pretend he had no idea what was happening. Ken had no illusions: he knew he was already as good as dead. Wherever he was now, Kase must have been laughing.

He struggled against it; an exercise in futility. Struggled to keep his eyes open, to work through the pain. Screamed at himself to get up, go find help. Ridiculous even to think it. The ends of his hair spilled into his face and hung into the gently swelling pool that was his own blood. Even through the heavy leather of his jacket and gauntlets Ken could feel the warmth of it, the quickening that was his racing pulse, the vigor with which it escaped from him. Arterial bleed. Nothing to be done about an injury like this; he knew it better than most. Even had the others found him immediately, the only thing they could have done for him was kill him that one bit quicker – maybe Aya would have done it, if he'd asked? – or, more likely, stand and watch as he bled his life out, but even that small grace was to be denied him. What difference did it make? He was dead anyway.

He couldn't see his killer, but he knew the man was still there. He hadn't heard him leave so he had to be. It wouldn't have surprised Ken to know that the man intended to watch him as he died, to witness his suffering and do nothing to ease it, not even by bringing it to an abrupt conclusion. Defiance said he would not be watched unknowingly, that he would not let this man treat his end as nothing more than a spectacle, a momentary diversion before returning to more profitable matters, even as rationality asked him what, in that case, the Hell did he propose to do about it. That's over, Ken. Let go… He raised his head, fighting back a wave of dizziness and exhaustion. Just to look up and it was almost more than he could manage.

He caught Farfarello's gaze and held it. His own eyes were wide and furious, pupils dilated, but already dulled with agony and inevitable exhaustion.

The moon-pale madman was watching him, watching with a certain kind of bemused curiosity on his face, as if he too had been caught off-guard by the sheer ease with which death had entrapped an adversary. It seemed almost as if Farfarello were disappointed in him, as if he had hoped for something more from one of Weiss than Ken had ultimately been able to provide. The hand which held his weapon was spattered with blood from that single, lucky blow. Pure fucking jam, in other words. Dumb luck and it had cost Ken his life. Even death wouldn't take him seriously. He should have laughed. He could have cried.

Farfarello must have known that skill had nothing to do with it – chance alone had done the job. But still he smiled. Ken would have cursed him if he hadn't known what it would cost him in pain.

Pain—quickly blossoming in the fertile ground that was his failing body, ensnaring it, holding it captive. Pain he refused to acknowledge, as if it would be a weakness to. He bit his lip, forcing back a moan. He could taste blood in his mouth – had he split his lip, or was it because of the tears inside him? No way of knowing, but even now he refused to give Farfarello the satisfaction of knowing that he hurt. Refused to add fuel to the fire. The demonstration of his distress would only gratify that twisted bastard further. Ken wasn't the kind to play into an enemy's hands and he clutched that knowledge to him as fiercely as he pressed his arms to his wounded, failing body.

It _mattered_ who he was, who he had been. It mattered now more than ever. He clung to himself.

But already he was losing his grip. Dividing, falling, weakening even as his mind screamed angry defiance.

Defiance. But to what end? He had no idea. It was over – there was no point in pretending there was anything left to play for. He was alone with his own murderer. It barely mattered what he had been before, or what he was now… Perhaps it was because the only thing left to determine was the manner of his own end and he wanted to die as the same man he had lived as, not as a stranger to himself. To die wasn't all that mattered. It was to die well. He still had his pride, thank God.

Funny, the things we cling to!

Ken tried not to think of the things that he was losing, of what and who he was leaving behind – it hurt in a way that was so much more than physical; an insidious, crippling pain. He'd thought he'd lost everything on the night his old life tore itself apart. Now? Now he was losing only what little remained. It was as nothing compared to what had already been destroyed and yet it hurt far more than the first death had done. For with it came the knowledge of his own failure.

He could never have forgiven himself that, had he been spared to do so.

Strange, the precision with which he saw the floor he lay on, the sweep of it. Then railings and an acute falling away to the treetops, the sky, the moon peering shyly from its veil of clouds. Farfarello, wraithlike in the darkness, stood at the far end of the balcony they had surprised one another upon, and watched. Ken had always heard told the world blurred. That it would turn into an old photo, out of focus and bleached of color. No. What he had got was a sudden desperate clarity as the mind went into overdrive. Stark focus, the world rendered so lucid it was almost hallucinatory. Was this how it had been for Kase, for all the others he'd killed?

Clarity. What a joke. So this was what it took to see clearly. In a strange kind of way it figured…

Ken coughed, and tasted blood on his lips. This time he couldn't keep back the gasp.

He saw Farfarello smile again, saw a strange kind of surmise cross his scarred face. Saw him move toward him and crouch by his side, compelled by the sight of his distress. Moth to the candle-flame. As if the lunatic's own incapacity to hurt drew him, fascinated, to the sight of it in other people. As if by witnessing it he could somehow hope to better understand the nature of suffering. Ken wondered what he was thinking, what conclusions the man's shattered mind would have drawn.

God hurts. How could He?

Ken pressed his arms ever more tightly against his chest, eyes closing briefly; he cried out softly at the pain it caused, shifting feebly and uneasily as if hoping to flee from it. He fought against the _fait accompli_ that was extinction and knew it was futile even as he prayed that it wouldn't be so, that something, anything might save him – hope. Always hope. His affliction…

What was there to hope for now? Nothing. A respite from pain, the pain which was becoming overwhelming… and death the only thing that could ease his torment. He could hope only that the end came quickly. Ken shivered. All of a sudden he felt cold, bitterly cold. He felt frightened. He wished he were amongst friends though he knew it would have made no difference, that his friends couldn't have saved him. Nobody could.

He was losing his way. Losing everything. He was dying.

Ken let himself give in to despair.

The end couldn't be worse than the process. He found Farfarello again on the periphery of his vision. Tried to turn to him, but his vision twisted alarmingly. The world swum. It blurred. To die is to drown, Ken realized. It is to drown in air.

Farfarello was crouching and watching him, an inhuman curiosity burning in that single eye, enthralled by the nature of human pain. He was cruel, but it was the cruelty of a child tormenting a pet. Does it matter to him, Ken wondered inanely, that it's me he's watching die? Is it because we're enemies? Because I hate him? Or would he be like this to anybody?

Oh, God, why was Farfarello just watching? If he'd had the strength, Ken would have torn open his own throat – to end the impasse. To get it over with. A strange victory over pain.

"Kill me." Ken managed, and his voice sounded hoarse, fragile and strange. Alien to his own ears. "Kill me now."  
The madman smiled as if the plea had gratified him. It probably had. Probably got off on it, Ken thought bitterly. "God mourns the suffering of His children." He said tangentially. He spoke as if reciting a parable, something rote-learnt in childhood.  
And Ken laughed. It hurt. His own laughter tore at him. It tore him apart inside. "No. Not over me…"

He coughed, blood welling and spilling over his lips. Strange that the trickle of it running down his chin should still feel uncomfortable. Strange he should laugh _in extremis_, as tears queued up and prickled at the corners of his eyes. Tears of pain, of loss – the why hardly seemed important. All that mattered was that, for now, he could still feel. He clung to that, too.

Odd, too, that he should feel elated by Farfarello's transient frown.

Farfarello lost interest. Moved from the abstract to the tangible, back to the world of blood and pain. He traced the line of Ken's lower lip with one finger. Encountering his blood and smearing it. He smiled again. Ken barely felt it. Didn't care. What could Farfarello do to him now that wouldn't be anticlimactic? There wasn't time for that. There wasn't _time_.

"God hurts." The madman said, calm as moonlight. As if it were self-evident.  
"No." Ken replied. Reinforced. He sounded lost, young, frightened. "He doesn't. He doesn't care."

Not for me. What God could mourn the death of a killer?

Something had broken inside him. Now when Ken breathed – shallow, harsh things, those breaths, every one excruciating and woefully inadequate – he breathed in blood. Don't try to talk, he would have said frantically had he been watching one of the others choking on their own blood, desperately hoping that silence and calm would save them. Don't talk, be still…

"Not over me."

But he knew it made no difference. He always had done. He had seen enough people finish like this to know what form his own end would take. It had to be karma which said he would helplessly bleed to death. A bleak cosmic joke cracked by fate.

"Kase—"

His voice broke on the second syllable. You were there before me. Always there before me.

The world, Ken's world, the tiny scrap of it that filled his trapped, clouding vision and which was all that remained to him, splintered and grew distorted at the edges. Now reality felt thick and clogged, as if by fog or fumes. Now his head swum. The tainted air felt heavy, hard to breathe. His chest burned. The flow of blood from his wound seemed to be slowing.

No way that the blood could be beginning to clot. His clothing was mired in it. The stench of it filled his nostrils. Even inside the now-useless gauntlets his hands felt cold. He felt cold. His heart raced. The end crept one bit closer.

The rasp of fabric on fabric told him Farfarello had moved. Farfarello's dexterous fingers sought out his wound, pulling his own bloody hands clear. Ken tried to push him away but he couldn't make himself move. His body felt heavy and strange as an ill-fitting overcoat. He hadn't been conscious of his own strength until that, too, was bled from him.

He whimpered at the feel of his murderer's hands tracing, in obscene fascination, the line of the wound that would kill him. A desolate sound, born of pain and anguish and the death of hope.

"God…"

Was he crying?

His voice caught in his throat and he choked. Not long now, Ken. Not long now.

Not long at all. Soon, perhaps, one of the others would find him, but not so soon he would be able to see them again. Aya. Youji. Omi. Any one of them. They would wonder where he had gone, why they hadn't seen him, who had screamed. They would find his body and they would know what had happened. Know that he had failed them, failed himself.

They would go home without him and it wouldn't matter. Not to him. For by then it would be over.

By then, Ken Hidaka would no longer exist anywhere outside of his teammates' memories.

Aya and Youji and Omi would remember him as someone whom they had worked with, if he was lucky as someone whom they had cared for, who had died alone and far too young. A half-remembered name, a mostly-forgotten face. A couple of faded photographs, a handful of fading memories, sepia-tinted and blurred as old film.

Ken Hidaka would become whoever the selective organ of memory made him.

And, gradually, they would disregard him. Because life went on. Because he would be dead but their lives would go on regardless. Because they had no choice.

He wished one of the others was here. Any of them, all of them. Wished that he could touch their hands, their faces, and smile. Smile in the face of their lies, their useless but heartfelt attempts at reassurance, at their attempts to impart some small measure of comfort in the face of annihilation. Wished someone – Omi, perhaps – would tell him he was going to be okay…

… wished to tell him no. I won't be. I know I'm dying.

Maybe he was crying.

Ken wondered what his replacement would be like, what the others would make of him, why he cared. Christ, what would they tell the kids when they asked what had happened to him…? He had to let go and he couldn't.

He hoped the others could forgive him his failure…

He _was_ crying. Silently, he wept for shame.

Life slipped between Ken's fingers. Reality did. It was now the world grew dim. It should have frightened him but his fear was falling away, too.

He was losing his grip on the actual – on emotion as well as sensation.

Ken was drunk on his own pain.

And declining, falling, failing. Sliding helplessly into obliteration, headed toward nothing at all…

… fading away.

It barely seemed to matter any more. The cold retreated. Pain drew back, reluctantly relinquishing its hold on him. Ken could feel only his own fatigue, the way the breath burnt in his lungs, the heavy unfamiliarity of his limbs.

Reality vanished as his eyelids fluttered closed. The shadows embraced him, greeting him like an old friend. The balcony, the treetops, the cloud-veiled moon were the last things Ken would have of the world.

Enervation overwhelmed him. He felt exhausted. But he felt nothing.

He drifted. It felt as if he were floating.

Even the pain was becoming irrelevant.

… he couldn't breathe. He had forgotten how to breathe. He was drowning.

Drowning in air…

… diving into the deep end. Hoping to touch the bottom. The incomparable darkness closed over him like water.

Gratefully, Ken slipped into inexhaustible night.

_-ende-_


End file.
